SACNet: A Spatially Adaptive Convolution Network for 2D Multi-organ Medical Segmentation

TL;DR

SACNet introduces a spatially adaptive convolution approach utilizing deformable convolutions and a novel loss function to improve multi-organ segmentation accuracy in medical images, addressing variability and background interference.

Contribution

The paper proposes a new adaptive receptive field module and a parameter-efficient encoder-decoder architecture for enhanced multi-organ segmentation.

Findings

Outperforms existing methods on ACDC and Synapse datasets

Achieves higher segmentation accuracy and robustness

Efficiently balances class difficulty with a novel loss function

Abstract

Multi-organ segmentation in medical image analysis is crucial for diagnosis and treatment planning. However, many factors complicate the task, including variability in different target categories and interference from complex backgrounds. In this paper, we utilize the knowledge of Deformable Convolution V3 (DCNv3) and multi-object segmentation to optimize our Spatially Adaptive Convolution Network (SACNet) in three aspects: feature extraction, model architecture, and loss constraint, simultaneously enhancing the perception of different segmentation targets. Firstly, we propose the Adaptive Receptive Field Module (ARFM), which combines DCNv3 with a series of customized block-level and architecture-level designs similar to transformers. This module can capture the unique features of different organs by adaptively adjusting the receptive field according to various targets. Secondly, we utilize ARFM as building blocks to construct the encoder-decoder of SACNet and partially share parameters between the encoder and decoder, making the network wider rather than deeper. This design achieves a shared lightweight decoder and a more parameter-efficient and effective framework. Lastly, we propose a novel continuity dynamic adjustment loss function, based on t-vMF dice loss and cross-entropy loss, to better balance easy and complex classes in segmentation. Experiments on 3D slice datasets from ACDC and Synapse demonstrate that SACNet delivers superior segmentation performance in multi-organ segmentation tasks compared to several existing methods.